Desmond Mason countered the three by making a clutch mid-range jump-shot 21 seconds later to give the Bucks a two-point advantage. Memphis’s where then denied on the following possession by an outstanding defensive play by Mo Williams, who was able to strip the ball of the penetrating play and simply took the ball away from him.
After making both free throws, the Bucks seemed to be out of the woods, leading 102-98 with only seven seconds left, but Andrew Bogut fouled Mike Miller with two seconds remaining. After making the first free throw, Miller intentionally missed his second and the ball bounced perfectly to the baseline as two Memphis players raced to corner the loose ball. Pau Gasol quickly got a hold of it and launched what would have been a game-tying three-pointer only to have the ball bounce of the left of the rim, improving Milwaukee’s record to 3-4 while Memphis fell to 2-5.Andrew Bogut had an outstanding game, going 9-of-14 from the field for 23 points, along with 12 rebounds and four blocks. Heading into his third season, it’s put up or shut up time for Bogut who needs to play up to the abilities he shown in being made the first overall pick in the 2005 draft. Despite his obvious upper strength, Bogut mostly needs to work on finishing his dunks to over-power opponents. Most of the time he will get fouled when going in for the dunk and just loses the ball. To compound this problem, he is not very good at the free throw line, making only 50% from the charity stripe. So instead of finishing the dunk with the chance at the three-point play, Bogut’s missing the dunk and only making one of the free throws, leaving multiple points of the scoreboard all throughout the game.
Mo Williams also had a fine game in handing out 12 dimes and scoring ten points for a tough double double. He also showed well on defensive in registering three steals, including the mentioned one that should have sealed the game.
His backcourt teammate Michael Redd had a good game, statistically wise, but forced too many shots and turned the ball over a few times just on traveling with the ball in trying to get by his guy, instead of just passing the ball. He did however play a huge role in the Bucks victory by finally finding his three-point stroke in making 5-of-7 threes, finishing with 31 points, six rebounds, and five assists. It seems, however, that Redd makes up his mind before he even gets the ball as to whether he’ll pass or shoot, instead of taking what the defense gives him. He seems capable of making the great pass, but hardly every passes once he starts his drive, instead of drawing the defensive in and kicking to an open teammate. Fortunately, he is excellent at finishing around the hoop, and does a great job of drawing the foul, often resulting in the Bucks easiest way to score points.
Charlie Villanueva gave the Bucks a lift in the second quarter in having the hot hand in making back-to-back three-pointers, followed by an array of mid range jumpers and a powerful dunk along the baseline where he finished despite getting fouled on the shot. He seems to have high potential, but Villanueva is far to inconsistent and is not as good of a defender as Yi Jianlian, struggled with his shot for most of the game, but made up for it by playing good defense and grabbing a season-high 13 rebounds, including seven on the offensive end. Yi played over twice as many minutes in the game (34) as Villanueva (14).
On a side note, Bucks Forward Michael Ruffin suffered a broken wrist in the blowout loss against the Spurs and will be out from 4 to 6 weeks. He broke it after falling hard onto the court after getting his legs taken out from under him. Despite only averaging 0.8 points and 1.0 rebounds in seven minutes per game, Ruffin played good defense and fought hard for a couple of loose balls. The only silver lining is that once he does come back from the injury, his game should already be at 100% since he doesn’t need to shoot the ball to be effective and rarely shoots as it is unless he has a wide open dunk.
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